Chapter 82: Shadow Heroes Deserve a Stage Worthy of Them!

"Kuriboh!"

The moment Rowan revealed Sphere Kuriboh from his hand, the little creature burst forth from the card with a cheerful cry.

A round, brownish ball of fluff, it floated upward through the night air above the skyscraper field...

And then stuck out its tiny legs and slid straight into Flame Wingman's ankles.

Flame Wingman, who had been standing dramatically atop the skyscraper like he owned it, was immediately sent tumbling off the edge and crashed down onto Jaden's side of the field, landing with his arms folded across his chest in a crouch.

Defense Position.

Jaden watched the whole thing unfold with a single drop of cold sweat running down his face.

His monster had leaped to the top of a skyscraper and been immediately tripped off of it by a small round puffball.

[Ding. Jaden Yuki Emotion Points +100.]

Alexis and Syrus stared blankly.

Jasmine and Mindy, however, along with a good portion of the female students watching from the stands, had a completely different reaction.

They pressed their hands to their cheeks, eyes sparkling.

"He's so cute!"

Back when Rowan had used Sphere Kuriboh against Alexis, they'd thought the little guy was just Rowan being provocative.

Watching him now, it felt entirely different somehow. And honestly, despite how ridiculous it looked, the little thing had just pulled off something genuinely impressive.

"Thanks, little guy," Rowan said, glancing toward the Graveyard zone on his duel disk.

He had originally planned to use the last face-down card instead.

But the two draws he'd gotten off Reckless Greed had included Sphere Kuriboh, a card he'd slipped into this particular deck precisely because it suited the mood of it, and now he could keep that remaining face-down for a better moment.

"Kuriboh!"

As if in response, a faint brownish silhouette flickered into view above Rowan's duel disk for just a moment, eyes crinkling with a cheerful squint, before fading back in.

"Getting stopped by Sphere Kuriboh... I really can't stand it," Jaden muttered, staring across the field at Masked HERO Dark Law, completely unharmed.

"That thing's still just sitting there..."

Of his two monsters, Flame Wingman could no longer attack.

The only one left with the option was Bubbleman, who had spent the past several turns getting his attacks batted back repeatedly until even he looked tired of it.

Bubbleman could still redirect to a new target and try again.

But against the 2400 attack points of the black-armored figure standing across the field, Dark Law wasn't going to fall.

Not even with Skyscraper temporarily pushing Bubbleman a thousand points higher.

"I'll set two cards face-down. Turn end."

Two more card silhouettes materialized on Jaden's field with a low thud.

Rowan looked them over without concern.

He seriously doubted this particular hothead had another Reckless Greed or Solemn Judgment hiding back there.

Whatever those two were, they were almost certainly HERO support traps or Quick-Play Spells.

"My turn. Draw."

Rowan pulled from the top of his deck and glanced at the card.

His hand was back to three after spending Sphere Kuriboh.

And when he saw what he'd drawn, the smile already on his face somehow became noticeably brighter.

More radiant. Almost offensively cheerful.

From across the field and in the stands, Alexis, Bastion, and even Professor Crowler all caught it immediately.

"Whatever that card is, it's definitely something terrible," Alexis muttered internally, and Syrus was thinking the exact same thing.

Even Jaden, standing directly across from him, felt the same creeping unease.

But that only made everyone more curious.

What had he just drawn? And what else did this peculiar HERO deck of his have up its sleeve?

"Jaden, I completely agree with something you said earlier. A dark HERO needs a stage worthy of dark HEROs."

Rowan smiled his most earnest, most unreservedly wholesome smile and lifted his left wrist.

In Jaden's expression of pure bewilderment, Rowan slid the freshly drawn card face-up into his Field Spell zone.

"Field Spell activate. Necrovalley!"

The ground shook.

The nighttime skyline of steel and glass collapsed in an instant, replaced by a vast valley of brown and black earth bathed in dying sunset light, dotted with ancient burial mounds stretching as far as the eye could see.

Several people in the stands who had been mid-sip sprayed their drinks. Bastion. Syrus. Chancellor Sheppard. All of them, simultaneously.

The ones who hadn't been drinking, Alexis among them, made the sound anyway.

The entire auditorium stared at the sun-soaked burial valley now surrounding the duel field, faces covered in question marks.

Necrovalley. That's what he called a stage worthy of HERO dueling.

Dark HEROs indeed.

He means it literally.

Though none of them had seen this Field Spell before, the name alone was enough.

Whatever Necrovalley did, it was not the sort of card that belonged in any remotely ordinary HERO deck.

Alexis and Bastion both suddenly felt like they understood, for the first time, exactly what kind of "HERO deck" Rowan had actually meant.

It wasn't a HERO deck. It was an anti-HERO deck.

"While Necrovalley is on the field, neither player can activate Spell, Trap, or monster effects from the Graveyard," Rowan said pleasantly.

Jaden's eyes went wide. "That means Quick-Play Spells like De-Fusion, cards that return Fusion materials from the Graveyard to the field, none of that works anymore?!"

Necrovalley had just locked off a significant portion of how Jaden's HERO deck operated.

The flexible, recursive use of his Fusion monsters was cut directly at the knees.

And as a bonus, it had overwritten and destroyed Skyscraper in the same move.

[Ding. Jaden Yuki Emotion Points +600.]

Something in the way Jaden was looking at the field had shifted, just slightly.